February marks a month of compassion, appreciation, and recognition for many great people and loved ones. Not only do we celebrate Black History month, President’s Day, and Valentine’s Day, we also celebrate random acts of kindness in the workplace. While you may have no desire to have a work jerk be your valentine, you can still celebrate random acts of kindness in your workplace by fostering respect, appreciation, and morale among your fellow colleagues, including jerks.

The Benefits of Showing Random Acts of Kindness in the Workplace

Work jerks can get under your skin, cause you stress, and negatively impact the way you feel about yourself and your workplace. Despite working with a jerk, celebrating random acts of kindness creates a more collaborative atmosphere and improves team performance. In fact, Gallup found that these actions can improve employee satisfaction by 50% and are more likely to be fully engaged at work. According to a LinkedIn study, respecting and appreciating coworkers is particularly vital to millennial employees because it leads them to becoming happier, more motivated, and more productive.

Using Perspective to Employ Random Acts of Kindness in the Workplace

So how can you implement random acts of kindness in your workplace? One solution I recommend is having Perspective. Perspective is one of my 5 Star Traits referred to in my upcoming book, How to Work with Jerks. Showing perspective improves your interaction with jerks in many different ways. No doubt jerks can create low morale and toxic environments, but you can combat that negativity by spreading love and compassion in the workplace through perspective.Perspective improves relationships with colleagues including jerks, and disarms a jerk right in their tracks during conflict and disagreements. Equally important, it can create a positive work environment and is ideal for expressing random acts of kindness.

Perspective is the ability to acknowledge the emotional diversity in others and respect their feelings regardless if we have not experienced it. This trait involves understanding their point of view in a situation. Below are four examples of how you can implement perspective in the workplace.

Seek to understand when communicating with others, seeking buy in or support on a decision or course of action, you need to be open to other points of views, even jerks. While it’s easy to assume the worst in people if they disagree with you, it may not always be the case because you never know what someone else is going through personally or professionally. But if you seek to understand their point of view, you will have a better perspective on where they are coming from. You can seek to understand by practicing the 2nd example, active listening.

Use Active Listening to diffuse tense situations, mitigate conflicts, and manage disagreements in the workplace. A key component of perspective is listening. Really, listen to the other person’s perspective and hear the entire message. When communicating with a jerk, or engaged in conflict or disagreements, do your best to actively listen by asking questions, confirming your understanding, and clarifying anything that does not make sense. This puts the focus on the situation rather than the personal feelings you may have towards someone. Give that person your full attention so they can open up and be completely honest with you. Give them the reassurance that what they have to say is important.

Empower, don’t micromanage. For people in leadership positions, with the exception of newer staff who are still learning the ropes, it is important to empower your staff to get the work done instead of leading every detail of the assignment. It builds trust, respect, and accountability. People will be more engaged, empowered to make decisions, and and are more willing to participate in work activities.

Use the 3 Up, 3 Down approach when developing people, providing feedback, and helping them get acclimated to a new task. This boosts their confidence, level of engagement, and builds momentum and progress. Don’t always focus on the negative. While it is good to communicate expectations and ways to improve, also provide balanced feedback and words of encouragement. This will motivate jerks you manage to get the job done right and meet your expectations. Acknowledging the good things in addition to the things that need improvement will help cultivate their ability to learn and improve.

Employing these tips will cultivate an atmosphere of respect, appreciation and engagement among all coworkers, including jerks. You do not have to wait until the month for February to engage in simple acts of kindness, you can employ these methods at any time. Showing perspective can help you maintain your passion for work, compassion for others, while also maintaining your sanity, in spite of working with jerks.